Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. speaking at a Domestic Violence Awareness Month event in Washington on Thursday.Credit Zach Gibson/The New York Times

Looming over Hillary Rodham Clinton’s testimony on Thursday before the House panel investigating the attacks in Benghazi, Libya, is the question of whether Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. will, after many weeks of consideration, decide to begin a presidential campaign.

Much ink has been spilled on predicting what Mr. Biden will decide, particularly after Mrs. Clinton’s dominant performance in Tuesday night’s Democratic debate. Many observers saw little evidence of a path for Mr. Biden afterward. And while President Obama has spoken warmly of Mr. Biden, there is little so far to suggest that he is planning to pick sides if the race featured his vice president against his former secretary of state.

But Mr. Biden’s thoughts do not seem to be geared around conventional wisdom or prognostications. Mrs. Clinton’s testimony will be followed by rallies in Virginia and then in Iowa, where she and other Democratic hopefuls will appear at the Iowa Democratic Party’s Jefferson-Jackson Dinner.

It was at the Jefferson-Jackson Dinner in November 2007 that Mrs. Clinton saw her position in the race slip irreversibly, when Mr. Obama, then an Illinois senator, eviscerated her in a speech without directly naming her.

This year’s dinner could provide another benchmark for Mr. Biden to make his decision, either because Mrs. Clinton performs well, or because he decides to make a last-minute appearance there.

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